A Voice for Men’s ongoing campaign to convince the world that “Men’s Human Rights Activists” are a bunch of petty, malicious, sexually insecure douchenozzles continues apace.
I mean, that must be what they’re really up to, right? Because no one who actually had any real interest in human rights of any kind would produce “memes” like the one above and all the rest below, delivered to your eyes straight from AVFM’s Fcebook page.
At their best, AVFM’s memes are merely baffling …
… or ridiculous.
AVFM also loves appropriating the images of famous people, and pretending that these people are somehow on their side. But their choices of imaginary celebrity endorsers can be a bit, well, ironic. A couple of days ago in one of my posts on the iconography of the “Cultural Marxism” conspiracy theorists, I posted a neo-Nazi meme showing a crudely photoshopped picture of Star Trek’s Kirk and Spock endorsing Adolph Hitler — a rather odd conceit, given that William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy are both Jewish, and that the original Star Trek series promoted tolerance and a very 60s-liberal sort of multiculturalism.
Well, here’s AVFM’s attempt to make Spock an MRA:
Dudes, hate to break it to you, but Nimoy is actually a … feminist. Really. In the 60s he demanded that Star Trek’s producers pay actress Nichele Nichols the same as her male counterparts on the show. And as a photographer today, Nimoy acknowleges that he is heavily influenced by feminism, partiularly the writings of Jewish feminist Letty Cottin Pogrebin, one of the founders of Ms. magazine.
So that’s not really his “listening to feminism face” at all.
An astonishing number of AVFM’s memes are so sexualized that they are more or less soft-core porn. Even their anti-male-rape memes, ostensibly attempts to raise consciousness about the rape of men by women, feature seductive, scantily clad women, undermining whatever message they are supposed to be getting across.
But the most, er, revealing memes are the ones that hint at deep sexual insecurities on the part of the meme makers and those who “like” them on Facebook. (The images that follow are mildly NSFW.)
This meme, for example, actually features the dreaded vagina dentata:
[slightly risque meme removed]
And this one attempts to shame male feminists by suggesting they enjoy being penetrated, an act that’s really only “shameful” if you have some rather fucked-up notions of what is and what isn’t appropriate male sexuality. And a certain degress of hatred and fear of female sexual agency.
[slightly risque meme removed]
AVFM meme-maker John Galt also continues to be weirdly obsessed by me.
And then there’s this lovely meme, intended as a joke at the expense of a feminist activist who’s been on AVFM’s enemies list ever since she told some AVFM dudes to shut up at a demonstration several years ago. (I’ve crossed out her face, because no one really deserves to be made into an AVFM meme.)
[slightly risque meme removed]
The joke is obviously supposed to be at her expense, suggesting that she is so unattractive that she makes penises wilt. But you don’t have to be Sigmund Freud to realize that this isn’t the real story here. This is a woman demonized by AVFM and other antifeminists because once, several years ago, she shouted down some dudes. It’s not her appearance that frightens their penises; it’s the fact that she wouldn’t put up with their bullshit.
Guys, you’re not fooling anyone, except yourselves.
I’ll be honest I have basically saved the previous comment in a text file and just change the username. So many of these idiots seem to need those two links!
I just realised idiots is perhaps ableist, I’m sorry if it is. I’ll be more careful.
Oh thank you Guest. 🙂 Please use al [at] tuff-enuff.co.uk [Hey, I got outvoted at the board meeting about the name of the company!!]
Speaking of spam, hope people don’t mind me posting this but one of my top three heroes is finally getting the recognition she deserves:
http://www.fightmagazine.com/mma-magazine/suffragette-city-the-curious-influence-of-jiu-jitsu-in-early-20th-century-england-6547/
[W E Fairbairn and Orde Wingate to head off the follow-up question]
“Woman is exposed to many perils nowadays, because so many who call themselves men are not worthy of that exalted title” ~ Edith Garrud [1910]
Phew, thank goodness that’s changed eh folks?
LOL that is a great name. And thanks for the article, I have a few steampunk friends who are into Bartitsu who will love it.
Ha, went back to my home county for the first time in 22 years recently. Ended up in a really nice pub. Some folks in there dressed rather magnificently.
“Oh wow, love your steampunk look”
“What’s steampunk?”
Gotta love Yorkshire 🙂
Why did I click one of those links and read the FB comments? Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy?
Dude! I am in Yorkshire! God’s Own Country! (Not from here, alas, but I get to be an honorary Yorkshirewoman at Yorkshire Day every year.) And there was a big steampunk con in Donny last year 🙂
You *thought* it was a steampunk convention; but that’s just Sunday best in Doncaster. 🙂
Hey, and Yorkshirewoman is a state of mind not a birthplace thing. If you think it, you are it.
🙂 that’s exactly what they tell me…and I consider it an honour.
Oh, and let’s share this snippet of dialogue from one of Yorkshire’s best-loved exports:
http://www.wimp.com/yorkshiredialect/
Glad to have you in the family!
Now of course Yorkshireness is the ultimate privilege; but we recognise that and don’t use our superior status to oppress those who have the misfortune not to be.
Unless they’re from Lancashire obviously, bunch of………..
That is fabulous.
There’s a guy from Lancashire who comes to York every year (when he can get off work), wearing a fedora with red roses and carrying a Lancashire flag, to wish us a happy Yorkshire Day. But yeah…witches and all that.
Oh my word, isn’t he amazing?
Amazing actor (can make ‘Waiting for Godot’ endurable) but also a wonderful human being:
He, I suppose it’s very on topic for this site to point out that the main thing about the poor Pendle girls is that they weren’t witches *obviously* but were killed for having the audacity to stand up to men.
Reblogged this on SHES TOO LOUD.
Alan – it doesn’t surprise me at all. Many of the non feminist women I know are fairly negative about men. I know someone who is anti feminist and still makes sweeping and rude comments about men. Non feminist women also tend to shame men for things like: showing ‘too much’ emotion. wanting to be sexually sub, having a typically ‘female’ job, cross dressing, not being aggressive enough etc etc. Feminists tend to be a lot more accepting of such traits or behaviours.
Alan again – also women and girls were persecuted as witches if they were not valued in the community. This is why elderly women were so often persecuted. I think it was the Pendle case where one woman said that she tried to make a living as a witch, knowing the possible outcome because her life was already so unbearable to be hanged as a witch was preferable than starving to death. Suicide being so unacceptable.
Aaaaand our troll still hasn’t anted up proof that feminists actually hate men. Yawwwwwn.
So, Yorkshire is steampunk by nature, eh? Must go see it, if ever I’m in the UK…
@ Bina
So it would seem. It may be because Yorkshire enjoyed a massive economic boom during the industrial revolution. There were many reasons for this, not least that it sits atop the largest deposit of steam coal (yup, that’s what it’s called) in Western Europe. There are a large amount of wonderful buildings and infrastructure built around this time. That’s all still there with a slight veneer of modernity, so t does have a bit of a general steampunk look anyway.
There’s also a cliched Yorkshire way of dressing which is pretty much Victorian rising middle class (flat caps, waistcoats, fob watches etc), almost like our heyday is encoded in the collective conscience. Obviously not everyone dresses like that, but you can do and nobody thinks it’s odd. It’s only because I’ve been absent from the place for so long it stood out when I returned,
Hmm, there’s probably an article to be written analysing this.
@ Ellesar
That article was *really* interesting. It does confirm your thesis. In essence feminists are more tolerant of individual lifestyle choices (for both genders) and don;t judge either gender by reference to some ideolised, and nigh on unattainable, gender stereotype. Also you’re less likely to see us as a lost cause when we don’t measure up (thank you for that), you think people can improve rather than be written off.
There’s also some research on ethnicity and attitudes to men. Don’t want to give away any spoilers other than to say our MRA friends may be disappointed if they assume that they’ll be worshipped by exotic maidens from faraway lands 🙂
…I don’t really understand how you can have a marriage with someone who shames you for being yourself. Sounds pretty unhappy.
There must be a pun somewhere in the dude-swimming-down-a-road one, but it’s just not coming to me.
My life?
Liquid
Fucking
Road
(Liquid fucking g…)
*Whiney voice* I wish I could get BBC!